Delicious Detours
by Squidward Cullen
Summary: Sometimes we wonder what could have been, had we made that one critical decision differently. This is Chuck's "what if".


Eek, I'm so excited! First Pushing Daisies fanfic! Big fan of the show and all, blah blah blah. Don't own the characters, blah blah blah. Bryan Fuller blah blah Jesus blah blah.

Brief introduction: This is clearly AU. And I don't mean same character names, different everything. I mean alternate universe, divergence of the timeline based on the result of a coin toss. Have you ever seen the movie _Sliding Doors_ or the universe-in-a-box episode of Futurama? I often wondered what would have happened if Chuck never went on the cruise. Would she still have met Ned again? (Obviously.) Would she still have ended up dead and brought back to life? (That remains to be seen.) When fate offers you a different path, is there a different destination at the end, or is it just a detour? I know, big philisophical questions. This is just the first chapter.

Okay, enough chit chat. Future chapters will not have nearly so much rambling, I promise. PLEASE TO ENJOY!

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Delicious Detours

Chapter 1: Stop and Go

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Once upon a time, Charlotte Charles flipped a coin.

She was sitting in the back of a bus headed to the airport, her suitcase sitting beside her all packed for a fantastic all-expenses-paid Tahitian cruise getaway. She had been fiddling with the coin in her hands for some time, turning it over and over nervously. She was happy to finally be going somewhere exciting for once in her life—to leave her aunts' neuroses and dust and empty birdcages behind and set off on a grand adventure. She wanted to stuff her face at a buffet, see glitzy shows with women in feathered headdresses, and drink champagne in a hot tub with a handsome stranger under the stars in the middle of the South Pacific. She absolutely could not wait.

But something in the back of her mind was yelling at her that this was a bad idea. Red warning lights were flashing behind her eyes and giving her a headache. Charlotte knew that her intuition was telling her something important; after all, Aunt Vivian used to say that migraines mean danger. Charlotte had never really understood the meaning of the maxim before, but now she was beginning to. Suddenly, a battle was raging within her over whether to listen to the happy butterflies in her stomach or the angry siren in her head. Both were pretty compelling signals, but which one was more important? She felt like Alice in Wonderland, pondering which mushroom to eat. _One will make you taller, and the other will make you smaller._

So, going against everything she had ever been taught, she decided to leave the matter to chance. A coin flip, to be exact. Heads, she would stay on the bus and fulfill her destiny; tails, she would get off at the next stop and wait for the bus back to Coeur de Coeurs and go home and let life continue just as it had for the past nineteen years.

She tossed the coin in the air and caught it. She held her breath and closed her eyes as she flipped the coin onto the top of her other hand. She slowly peeked one eye open and exhaled sharply as she looked upon the answer.

Although statistically quarter flips tend to come out heads more often (due to the distribution of weight on the two faces of the coin), for Charlotte it was tails. Yes, tails. Game over. Go home. No cruise for you. That's what you get for letting a coin make your tough decisions for you. Did you learn nothing from Harvey Dent?

With a heavy sigh, Charlotte gathered her suitcase and purse and waited for the upcoming stop. They were in the heart of the city now, in an area she wasn't terribly familiar with. There was a bank, a bookstore, a place with a pie crust for a roof, a spa. Where was that bus stop?

As if reading her mind, the bus suddenly rolled to a stop on a lonely block of street. The sun was just beginning to set, and Charlotte felt more than a little nervous. She stood up, bags in hand, and slowly walked down the aisle to the front of the bus. The driver opened the door for her; she thanked him with a smile and a polite nod. She stepped out into the cool evening air, breathing in deeply. Almost as soon as the bus began to drive away Charlotte began to regret her decision.

"Stupid, stupid Chuck!" she shouted to no one, stamping her foot and calling herself by the nickname she hadn't been called since she was a wee girl. She wanted desperately to be able to throw a temper tantrum right there, in front of a boarded-up abandoned pet store and the ghosts of kitties and puppies past, but she thought better of it. She had to be calm, be cool, and get her head back on her shoulders. Things weren't so bad: after all, it was only seven o'clock; she had two hundred dollars in her wallet for emergencies (like this one!); and she spoke Japanese. She was a big girl and she could find her way home. No sweat.

But first she had to get something to eat. There was no way she could have a clear head with an empty stomach!

She began walking in the direction the bus had come from, her suitcase banging against her leg with every step. So far she didn't see any restaurants; from what she knew there weren't many on this street. Maybe she could get a hunk of that giant pie a few blocks back.

As she walked, Charlotte's thoughts turned to pie. It was one of those fabulous delicacies that everyone always seemed to take for granted, and yet another reason why she felt as though she had been cheated her entire life. She had no mother to make Mom's Apple Pie, or any pie, or any pastry—and her aunts simply didn't "do" baking. When she was little she always envied her neighbor, Ned; his mom was _always_ making pies. When she would come over to his house after a long day of fun, Charlotte would always be welcomed with a big, sweet, flaky slice with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top. Each slice of Ned's mom's pie was like a slice of heaven with all the motherly love in the world that she had been missing baked into it. It made her feel good. Ned made her feel good. And then the good feelings were gone.

Charlotte felt tears well up in her eyes as she thought back to the day her best friend and the center of her nine-year-old world had left. She had counted on him to help heal her heart after her father died; he was the only person she could lean on. And then his dad took him away forever, and that was that. He never even left a forwarding address. Instead of healing, the hole in her heart only grew bigger and bigger as time went by. At present, Charlotte was pretty sure that the hole had grown to a big enough size that several of her other organs had probably been consumed by it.

_Grooowwwwwl. _Especially her stomach. It was clearly expressing its demand for pie, and she could no longer ignore it. Charlotte quickened her pace as she noticed the pastry-shaped roof of the corner building come into view. Her heart began to leap as she fantasized about cherries and berries and peaches and ice cream and…_Oh hey, we're here!_

She looked up at the red neon sign above the door: THE PIE HOLE. _Very clever._ She peered inside the glass door to make preliminary reconnaissance. It looked clean and well-lit. The light fixtures above the booths were shaped like cherries. _Cute!_ There weren't too many people inside; she noticed a tall man and a petite blonde in aprons chatting with a portly black man who seemed to be angry at something; if the apron people had time to converse, they probably wouldn't mind little old her coming in and grabbing a slice or two.

Charlotte pulled on the handle of the door and stepped inside the Pie Hole. Immediately the smell of baking flooded her brain, triggering the release of endorphins and making her feel considerably happier than she was ten seconds ago. For a brief moment she just stood there, inhaling the sweet scent of pies.

Suddenly, she noticed eyes on her. All eyes, to be exact. The tall man, the fat man, the little woman—they were all staring at her as though she were a ghost.

"Hiya! Welcome to the Pie Hole!" shouted the blonde woman, smiling brightly and waving. "What can we get for you today?"

Charlotte looked around hesitantly. "I'd, um…I'd like some pie?"

"You've definitely come to the right place, then! Would you like a booth, or a table, or—"

"I'll just sit there," Charlotte answered, pointing to the bar in the center of the restaurant that afforded a nice view of the kitchen and some beautiful antique coffee-making equipment. She hopped up onto a barstool and let her suitcase and purse drop on the floor beside her. The tall man in the apron smiled broadly as he handed her a menu. Charlotte felt her pulse immediately spike as their hands brushed for a brief moment. She reflexively smiled back up at him.

"Our special today is lingonberry," he said, looking down as he wiped down the bar.

"Scandinavia's best!" Charlotte responded, giggling nervously. What was it about this man that was making her feel so silly? Stupid, stupid Chuck! You're here for pie, not boys!

_What about Pie Boys?_

"Do you know what you'd like, or do you need more time?" asked the Pie Maker, snapping Charlotte out of her thoughts. She quickly glanced down at the menu and immediately knew what she wanted.

"I'll have cherry. A la mode. Please."

"Anything to drink?"

"Just water."

"Coming right up." The Pie Maker flagged down the blonde waitress and whispered something to her. She nodded unenthusiastically and slid behind the bar as he disappeared into the kitchen.

"Ice?" she asked as she procured a glass from under the bar.

"Yes please," Charlotte replied, slouching forward. The waitress scooped some ice from a bucket into the glass and filled it with water from a pitcher. She reached under the bar and grabbed a lemon wedge, and with more flair than necessary balanced the wedge on the edge of the glass and handed it to Charlotte. "Thank you."

"Nothin' to it," the waitress said. "It's the least I can do; he never lets me work with the pies." She sighed heavily and leaned against the wall.

Charlotte raised an eyebrow. "Why not?"

"I dunno," shrugged the waitress. "Something with secret recipes or something. He says he'll tell me eventually, but," she leaned in closer to Charlotte, "I don't believe him. Ugh, he's such a space case sometimes."

Suddenly the Pie Maker emerged from the kitchen with a perfectly thick slice of cherry pie on a small plate, complete with a generous scoop of vanilla ice cream.

"Olive, you weren't saying bad things about me to the customers, were you?"

The waitress straightened up and clasped her hands behind her back. "Of course not! I would never say bad things about you to customers! Why would I do that; you're my favorite person?" She looked up at him with a smile so adoring that Charlotte felt her heart hurt. She wished that somebody, someone, no matter the reason, would look at _her_ that way.

And then, someone did. For a brief second she made eye contact with the Pie Maker as he handed her the plate, and she could have sworn he was looking at her _that_ way. For the second time in five minutes, Charlotte Charles felt her heart jump.

"Thank you," she said breathlessly, picking up her fork and digging into the pie. Both Olive the waitress and the Pie Maker watched her as she brought the morsel to her mouth and took her first bite.

The pie was beyond delicious. The crust was flaky and buttery, and the cherries were perfectly balanced between tart and sweet, and the warmth of the pastry contrasted so nicely with the coldness of the ice cream. It was as if she was nine years old again, eating pie at Ned's house on a summer's afternoon. Nobody was dead, nobody was gone, and nothing could possibly go wrong. It wasn't just pie; it was a feeling that Charlotte had missed for so long, and it was suddenly all flooding back.

"That's my favorite part," Olive whispered to her boss as they watched Charlotte eat. Fortunately, she couldn't hear them in her own world. Slowly she took little bites of the pie, savoring each piece and the long-buried memories that came with it.

"This is good pie," she finally said, her mouth full.

"Thanks," the Pie Maker replied, shifting from one foot to the other. "We try our best. Nothing says love like pie."

Charlotte pretended she hadn't heard that last sentence. Because if she had her mind would have started going into mushy fantasies about being married to the Pie Maker and having him bake her pies with love in every bite until she became morbidly obese and him loving her anyway. But, you know, it's a good thing she didn't hear that last sentence.

Hearing the _ka-thump_ sound in her chest and not wishing for anyone else to hear it, Charlotte quickly finished the last few bites of the cherry pie and chugged the rest of her water. She wiped the corners of her mouth with her napkin.

"Man, that really hit the spot. I haven't had pie like that since I was a little girl." Charlotte reached down and grabbed her purse off the floor. She rummaged around until she found her wallet. "How much do I owe you?"

"First one's free," said the Pie Maker, smiling. He had such a nice smile…

Olive the waitress rolled her eyes. "Geez, I thought only Emerson was allowed to have free pie."

"I better get free pie!" shouted the angry man in a booth, followed by a loud "Else you ain't getting your free cut of my money!"

Charlotte looked from the angry man to the Pie Maker. "Then it's not free pie."

"Pardon?" asked Olive.

"If he's giving you money and you're giving him pie, then it's not free pie for him _or_ free money for you."

The Pie Maker laughed. "You know, I think you're right." The angry man in the booth muttered curses under his breath.

Suddenly, Olive piped up. "Closing time!" She skipped from the bar to the front door and turned the sign from "Open" to "Closed".

"So it is," said the Pie Maker, sighing. He turned to Charlotte and picked up her empty plate and fork. "I'm sorry to do this to you, but it is time."

Charlotte suddenly remembered that she didn't have anywhere to go. The bus had probably stopped running by now. "Sure. No problem." She was going to have to find a hotel. Or a park bench. She started to feel uneasy again. "Thanks again for the pie. It was great." She shrugged on her jacket and picked up her suitcase.

"Our pleasure," the Pie Maker said cheerfully.

"I just wish I didn't have to come so far for it. You should think about opening up a shop in Coeur de Coeurs. Then I would come every day."

The Pie Maker suddenly tensed up, and Charlotte noticed his eye twitch at the mention of her hometown. She tried to shrug it off, but it just buried itself in the back of her mind like a pesky worm.

The Pie Maker and the waitress accompanied her to the door and showed her out.

As they stood in the open doorway, Charlotte Charles smiled up at the Pie Maker and he smiled down at her. She felt her heart begin to hurt again, but this time in an oddly pleasant way. She couldn't quite tell why, but she wanted to know more about him. No, scratch that—she wanted to know _everything_ about him. Things were clearly getting out of hand.

"You take care now," the Pie Maker said, flashing one last lopsided grin at Charlotte. "Have a good night."

"Thanks. And thanks for everything, Mr. Pie Maker." Charlotte kicked herself mentally; she had meant for that to sound coy and cute, but instead she sounded like a four year old.

"It's Ned." He went back inside and let the door shut, officially closing the Pie Hole for the night.

Her pie craving satisfied, Charlotte breathed a contented sigh and began walking back in the direction of the bus stop. Once again, her suitcase banged against her leg, but she was alright. She knew the Pie Maker's name: it was Ned.

_Ned._

_Ned. Pie Maker Ned._

_Ned?_

_My Ned?_

_Oh my god, My Ned!_

The realization hit her like a ton of pies. She stopped in her tracks and let her suitcase drop to the ground. For a moment she could only stand with her mouth gaping open. She felt dumb. She was dumb. It had been so obvious!

With a scream of both frustration and delight, Charlotte spun around one hundred and eighty degrees and took off running. Her suitcase could wait, she had to get to him.

"Neeeeed!" she shouted frantically. "Ned, it's me! It's Chuck!"

She felt her heart swell as she rounded the corner towards the Pie Hole. She was going to barge right through the doors and hug him and—

_Thud!_

She ran right into the locked glass doors.

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Okay, so _maybe_ Chuck is a litle OOC, but who's to say what that is? I mean, we only really get to see her through Ned's eyes on the show. Her personality could use a bit of elaboration. There are a lot of blanks to fill in!

Anyway, reviews...those are good. I like those. OM NOM NOM REVIEWS!


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